


Spirit

by Just_Trying_To_Get_Around_You



Series: The Spirit of L’manberg [1]
Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Dave | Technoblade and Wilbur Soot and TommyInnit are Siblings, Gen, Insane Wilbur Soot, Parent Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Schlatt is just mentioned, Spirit!Wilbur, but he gets enough mentions for a character tag, content warnings are in the summary, haha no, he kinda gets less human over time, is he a good parent?, sorry dream you’re outta luck, that’s the best way to describe it tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-02
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:48:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27832540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Just_Trying_To_Get_Around_You/pseuds/Just_Trying_To_Get_Around_You
Summary: Wilbur becomes very attached to the land he has claimed as his own.His life spirals from there.Warnings for: Graphic metaphors (description of gutting), major character death, injury, canon-typical grim storyline, and description of someone wasting away, implication of amnesia/memory loss, canonical parental neglect mentioned
Relationships: no - Relationship
Series: The Spirit of L’manberg [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2037130
Comments: 4
Kudos: 60





	Spirit

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [spirits and what they stand for](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27814501) by [bonkcake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonkcake/pseuds/bonkcake). 



> So uh go read the original concept because it’s short and v good. I kinda put my own spin on it because this kind of thing is what I do.
> 
> It’s pretty vague and jumps around quite a bit but eventually more will come in this universe, in detail, maybe even with dialogue!
> 
> If you are interested in this concept gimme a shout in the comments so I can muster up the motivation to keep going.
> 
> Also I wrote this in one sitting and it probably shows oops.
> 
> Mandatory Disclaimer:
> 
> If any of the creators in this work are uncomfortable with what I have written I will take it down. This is not intended to be about the real people, rather the characters each person plays on the Dream SMP. Please do not send this fic or this series to the people mentioned. Thanks!

When Wilbur first builds his van on this specific patch of land, it sings to him.

Not literally, but in small ways.

It blooms under his feet, and he feels the flowers sprout up under his heels as he walks like he’s attached bone meal to the soles of his boots. The trees feel like an extension of his own body, and the water moves with his breathing. He is perfectly in tune with this small space of land.

He just wanted to sell drugs, and he still wants to, but the way the land calls to him is interesting, and it feels good.

Tommy doesn’t seem to be experiencing any of the same things, and a small, undeveloped part of him is glad because he wants to keep this bliss (better than anything he keeps in the van) all to himself.

—

He marks out the land that he wants Eret to build the walls on. He knows exactly where his land ends and the land of the Dream SMP begins. 

Oh, _Dream._

Wilbur knows that Dream could feel that Wilbur had truly claimed his land. He thought somehow he could fight nature itself and win land that didn’t want to be won. 

His soul sings in tune with this land and even if the others (even his son) don’t fully understand why he’s so committed to this revolution all of a sudden, but as much as he laughs at the idea of Dream reclaiming this place, Dream has always managed to do the impossible.

He just hopes he will lose this time.

(Something is off about Eret, the wind whispers to him. Wilbur does not listen.)

—

When Eret betrays them, Wilbur feels strange.

There’s a moment where he is upset, broken, hurt, human and struggling to accept what has just happened.

Then there’s a moment where something old and fiery and inhuman and _livid_ rears up in his mind and suddenly he wants to claw Eret’s face off because _how dare he hurt this sacred place and its sacred people._

Eret is meant to be his, but he isn’t. The others are his though, they belong to this land, they did the moment they decided to fight for it and they bound themselves to him and this country, for better or worse.

Eret is breaking the unspoken oath he made and Wilbur banishes him from his land until the war is over.

(Not far away, Eret attempts to re-enter after the blast to spy on the recovery efforts. The walls burn him when he gets too close. He is no longer welcome.)

—

When his land explodes, Wilbur screeches, despite the explosion never touching him. The others must attribute it to mental anguish but the pain he experiences is very literal and physical.

(If the fire wasn’t enough.)

He feels like someone is carving out his insides.

When the explosions stop and he gets a moment to breath, they assemble to discuss surrender and what to do next, but Wilbur feels broken, like his organs are just hanging out of his body.

The others attribute his pain to the fact that his small nation was just blown up.

—

After the duel and Tommy’s sacrifice, Wilbur is reinvigorated, giddy, and flowers spring up under his feet as he leads his men back to the Camarvan. It was a victory in the end.

(Tubbo looks concerned at the flowers, but keeps his mouth shut to ask later.)

After the others go back to their homes, Wilbur stays in the Camarvan. He sits on the steps leading to the door and it feels like a part of him is truly complete, the ground humming its own version of the anthem Wilbur made for it. The notes whistle past his ears in the wind and he closes his eyes. 

His mind fills up with a deep calm and a consciousness not fully his own settles in the back of his brain, comfortable and right.

For a brief moment, he is not Wilbur Soot, but a large expanse of roots spreading throughout his whole land. He is not a president, but a voice for the ground, the water, the air, the trees, the flowers, every bit of L’manberg pulses through his expanse of a being and he exhales the thoughts of the land into itself again.

And then he is himself again, sitting on the steps of a van, the world behind his eyes just a bit bigger.

—

He holds an election, desperate for a true contract with the new people on his land, easing Tommy’s worries with a half truth and gathering his new citizens.

They feel like water cupped in his hands, one wrong move and they slip from his fingers, but if he can hold it together and prove to them that he _needs_ to stand and own this place because it is his _._

It is _him._

—

Tommy tells Wilbur that he feels sick as they run off into the wilderness, Wilbur with an arrow in his back, and Tommy standing on shaking legs.

He describes it as a burning nausea that feels “fucking nasty” and Wilbur knows it’s because the bond he had with the nation was forcefully severed. Tommy had the right to lay claim to the land of L’manberg just as Wilbur did, just not to the same extent, and therefore was experiencing the symptoms of pulling away.

Wilbur himself felt like his entire being was in knots. He would give anything to be on his land right now, standing and listening to the extensions of his mind and body in the water and wind. Out here, he feels cold and wrong, sick and feeling like he had just drunk a poison potion, that it would eventually weaken him enough that a single touch would shatter him.

The nation itself would weaken too while he was gone, he knew, but he couldn’t do anything about it.

He couldn’t very well go and tell Schlatt that.

—

Techno sees something off with Wilbur, and he has first-hand experience with Distance Sickness, albeit not as severe as what Wilbur is clearly experiencing.

(Techno had never really bound himself to any land on SMP Earth, they all knew the Server wasn’t going to last forever and Techno had always had that itch to travel and conquer.

He still got light-headed when he left his land for too long though, and Phil was by his side.)

He wonders if Wilbur has anyone to confide in, and knowing his brother, he doesn’t.

Techno elects not to be that person, thinking that surely anyone else would take notice that Wilbur was two sharp flicks away from crumpling to the floor in a dead heap.

Surely somebody would notice that Wilbur has tied himself so tight to his land that he was close to just getting sucked into the grass the next time he set foot there.

(Tubbo noticed, but he also kept quiet, only offering a silent hand to Wilbur whenever he looked like he needed it.)

—

He feels it when it’s too late for them to truly take back what had been lost. The pull of the land he claimed is gone and all that is left is the pain and dull emptiness.

He screams himself to sleep.

—

Wilbur feels dead.

He feels like the last remnants of life and love and joy in his chest have died like pathetic embers and all that is left is the inhuman rage pulsing through his brain and that familiar cold.

That’s why he takes the explosives from Dream.

That’s why he feels like Tommy isn’t his brother anymore, in the same way Phil isn’t his father.

That’s why he feels like the only one he can truly put his faith in is Technoblade.

That’s why he plants explosives rigged to blow under the newly christened Manberg.

(The change puts a bitter taste in Wilbur’s mouth and his chest twists up again, like Schlatt is personally stabbing him through the gut.)

That’s why he plans to blow it all up.

—

He can feel the ground underneath him reaching out to suffocate Schlatt where he stands, hunched over and pathetic.

He wants to do it himself, but he can’t. He wants Tommy to do it but his instincts tell him that something is wrong, and he stays the executioner’s crossbow bolt.

And Schlatt dies of a heart attack.

(Or at least it looks like one.)

—

Wilbur gives the stand to Tommy, knowing he will go underneath the podium and blow everything to pieces because the ground under his feet is now dead. It’s a stopped heartbeat, a clogged pipe. It will never beat the same way again, even if Wilbur gives his remaining life force to the land beneath his feet.

There is nothing he can do but put the nation out of its misery.

Then Tommy tells him that he should be president, and he feels so wrong up on the podium, the sickly black ooze of the monstrosity behind him reminding him of the death in his soul.

He brings Tubbo up and he slips away after his speech.

Wilbur moves to the room with the button and traces his finger along the words on the walls. He feels like he’s moving smoothly again, and he sits down in his chair and leans back.

He monologues to himself as he considers the button-

-and then he hears Phil’s voice and his entire world stops moving.

He feels a rush of humiliation and fear like he hadn’t felt in so long and part of him can’t help feeling grateful for the feeling.

(It makes him feel human again.)

Phil tries to convince him not to press the button and Wilbur breaks.

He tells Phil everything, every feeling he felt even before winning L’manberg, the banishment and the horrible death of his land. He tells Phil everything and cries until he can’t anymore.

For a moment he can almost convince himself that his father loves him.

He presses the button anyway, and he feels his body withering away as the ground ruptures and splits and everything _explodes_ and Wilbur feels the familiar sensation of being ripped apart and welcomes it.

He tells Phil to finish the job.

After some protest, he does.

—

_Wilbur feels at peace._

_He can’t remember much of anything._

_But it doesn’t matter._

_He stands up in a field of flowers and trees, along with a river down a small hill. There’s a van there, and it feels like home._

_This whole place feels like home._

_He walks into the van and closes the door._

_It feels like the air is hugging him, through his warm yellow sweater, and it feels familiar._

_He is finally able to feel like his truest self._

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah
> 
> Follow my Tumblr @kikiofthevast and shout ideas at me, I always welcome concepts.
> 
> Also if you want me to expand upon certain concepts/scenes in this fic I will take requests! I may not do all of them due to lack of motivation but I will try!


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